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Effect of Synchrotron Losses on Multiple Diffusive Shock Acceleration

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  05 March 2013

Don Melrose  and
Ashley Crouch
Don Melrose
Affiliation:
Research Centre for Theoretical Astrophysics, School of Physics, University of Sydney, NSW 2006 Australia; [email protected]
Ashley Crouch
Affiliation:
Department of Mathematics, Monash University, Clayton, Vic. 3168, Australia; [email protected]
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Abstract

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The effect of synchrotron losses on diffusive shock acceleration (DSA) at many shocks is treated numerically. Synchrotron losses determine a maximum energy to which electrons can be accelerated through DSA, and this is referred to as the synchrotron cutoff, pc . The distribution of accelerated electrons after many shocks is found (a) for a distribution injected at the initial shock, to tend to a plateau [f(p) independent of p ≲ 0·1pc ], and (b) for the cumulative distribution from injection at each shock to tend to f(p) ∝ p–b with b ≈ 3 well below the synchrotron cutoff with a peak in the slope (b min ≈ 2) at p ≲ 0·1pc . It is suggested that the latter result might account for the flat synchrotron spectra observed in some Galactic Centre sources.

Keywords

particle accelerationflat synchrotron spectra, shock waves
Type
Research Article
Information
Publications of the Astronomical Society of Australia , Volume 14 , Issue 3 , 1997 , pp. 251 - 257
Copyright
Copyright © Astronomical Society of Australia 1997

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